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Abstract
In a scenario characterized by the globalization of the markets, the competitiveness of firms
across the industries and mainly in the agri-food sector is linked to their capability to make distinguishable
their products and communicate their uniqueness. Branding can concretely answer
to these needs allowing firms to compete by communicating the quality and all that set of
factors that differentiate their own offer by the competitors.
Anyway, brand management in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) is a field of study in its
infancy, and one in which real interest was shown only during the final decade of the previous
century. Although considerable literature has been published about brand management in general,
all theory and case studies are focused only on multinationals and big companies operating
in the food sectors, such as Coca Cola, Unilever, Procter & Gamble.
This is however ignoring the fact that more than 95% of businesses in the European Union are
small and medium enterprises (Eurostat 2004) and that this composition, confirmed in the agrifood
sectors, contribute to make the European market extremely interesting and profitable.
The objective of this paper aims to contribute to already existing research in the field and shows
the role and importance of brand management in food SMEs and all the key factors that supports
it.
Our analysis will highlight as the term brand in agri-food SMEs is initiated and supported by an
active role of the entrepreneur who is a fundamental actor in the achievement of brand recognition.
Thus, directors and managers of small food companies should place brand management in
a top position in their daily mind set, since achieving brand recognition starts inside the organization
itself. Beside, the paper describes the real opportunity offered by new technologies (web,
internet, B2B…) that allows small food companies to build their brand in a more effective way
and reach a larger market in a low cost.
To meet these objectives a qualitative research methodology was carried based on case studies,
since this latter allows to understand more in detail firm’s behaviours and strategies. The food
small and medium enterprises that were selected are located in the South of Italy and all of them
have a web-site.
These case studies were built based on structured questionnaires that have been firstly sent by
mail, and was followed by face to face interviews with entrepreneurs and director of sales and
marketing department.
The results obtained are extremely interesting and representative of the importance of brand management
both for food SMEs, as key element to innovate, grow and to be distinguished as well
as for the entrepreneur in building, through the use of new technologies, a successful brand management
strategy of his own company.